Junel and I met at Etsy craft party back in 2015. We followed each other on instagram but hadn’t had a chance to meet each other since then. This Spring, she contacted me to make her wedding dress and I was happy to say yes! Her wedding is in Singapore but she is based in Tokyo. She was looking for a casual knee length dress that would fit her lunch wedding, but had hard time fining the right one in Japan. Japanese wedding dress shops often have many Disney princess inspired puffy dresses but if you are looking for something casual and relaxed it can be a bit tricky.
from left to right
– David’s Bridal
– Inbal Dror
– BHLND
As always, we started by collecting and sharing images of her dream wedding dress on Pinterest. After she pinned, we looked at the collection of pictures and tried to figure out common themes. Knee length, lace and V neckline were consistently at the front of the line. This process is very helpful in narrowing down the options since browsing pictures on Pinterest can be overwhelming. Going back to the board and look for a common theme will help navigate what style of the dress we want to go for. 
Here is the sketch we came up with based on the pinned images. We ended up making both front and back V necklines. The right sketch above is by Junel. Her illustration is amazing! She is a freelance illustrator. 
We picked this ivory tulle lace. Since finding good quality lace is rather difficult in Japan, I bought this on etsy. Ivory has more casual feel to it than pure white, which is what she was going for in her wedding. The scalloped edge will be used for the hem of the dress and V neckline.
NEXT POST | I’ll show you the finished dress and the fitting with Junel!
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The more I work with Kimono fabric, the more comfortable and the faster I get with it. Practice makes perfect! This mint green one was particularly fun since the colors are so vibrant. I had a roll of kimono fabric (tanmono) to start with. First, I look through meters of fabric to see where the prints are and try to find the matching print. Then I connected the matching print just like you match stripes or plaid. The width of the kimono fabrics are usually narrow like 36-38cm (more 
These solid color dresses were much easier required less thinking. Still, there was some stripes going on so I cut carefully not to disturb the stripes. 
Of all six dresses, I am most drawn to this cream color one. The silk is so soft and drapes beautifully. For this one, I could not find the perfect print match, but still went for similar print so that you can see the continuity. You can see the picture above that the pink (orange?) clouds matches but the purple cloud right above does not. Sometimes you just have to make the decision based on which mismatch is less noticable. You can see more of my kimono upcycling projects 
